Respect science in great climate divide

It says a lot about the federal government’s difficulty in promoting its carbon change policy that its best advocate is staring across the parliamentary chamber taunting Labor’s ministers, as well as his own side, with his periodic bouts of truth in marketing.

Malcolm Turnbull
was at it again on Thursday night, taking advantage of a convenient event to repeat much, but not all, of his well known position on climate change.

It’s hard to blame him for touching on the subject given that he was delivering a commemoration address for
Virginia Chadwick
, who broke the glass ceiling for women in NSW Liberal politics, then went on to a respected second career as head of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority.

Despite what his many critics will undoubtedly say, Mr Turnbull was doing a service for his party with the broader Australian electorate by reminding it that the Liberals have a proud record of environmental policy based on accepting scientific and economic advice, even when interventionist decisions were at odds with the interests of some supporters.

But the internal critics of Mr Turnbull, who was environment minister in the latter years of the Howard government, should pay heed to the predictable Labor reaction to the speech.

Treasurer
Wayne Swan
claimed Mr Turnbull knew Opposition Leader
Tony Abbott
was a sceptic, and Climate Change Minister
Greg Combet
said there was a rift in the Coalition ranks. This might look like normal political grist to the mill but it is a reminder that the Rudd government spent much of 2009 playing the opposition numbers rather than using the then strong community support to implement a market-based carbon emissions reduction policy.

The problem for Labor is that Mr Turnbull has stuck to a consistent position on the issue to the point where he had the temerity in his speech to describe climate change as a moral challenge, a phrase that still haunts Labor. The government will never again have the credibility to occupy that high ground but it needs to focus more on the facts than opposition divisions.

Mr Turnbull is right to argue that the Australian political system runs the risk of being infected with the growing tendency in US politics to reject the best efforts of scientists. While climate science is not as settled as some other fields – as new research on sea levels has shown during the week – the overwhelming consensus suggests we should be taking action to reduce the risks.

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But instead, the attacks on science mean that valuable momentum is being lost on devoting our best minds to how Australia can make an adjustment to a cleaner-energy economy with techniques such capturing emissions from coal. The best way of saving long-term jobs in the coal industry is to trust Australian scientists to find ways to have our better-quality coal used at home and abroad.

One of the ironies of this debate is that in the large emerging-market countries that sceptics criticise for not leading the way on emissions cuts, science is increasingly more respected than in some advanced countries where it has been the foundation of economic success.

Climate-science rejecters and those happy to go along for the ride should think about what sort of future they are bequeathing Australia when the best efforts of our scientists are routinely disparaged, and the same science is taken more seriously in less developed countries.